Photo of Dayna Bateman by Susan Sabo

Dayna Bateman is a recovering tech worker (MSc, HCI) and an emerging writer. Her work has appeared in trade publications like Internet Retailing and literary journals like Pacifica and The American Literary Review. Dayna is a recipient of the 2026 PEN/Jean Stein Grant for Literary Oral History and is a 2026 Klaustrið Artist in Residence.

About me and my work

I received the 2025 ALR Essay Prize for my essay Deracination, Or How to Disappear, which interrogates the decision of my Indigenous Sámi ancestors to pass for White in the racial climate of 1880s America. An alum of the Tin House, Kenyon Review, and Granta Memoir Workshops, I was awarded a Storyknife Residency on the strength and promise of my memoir-in-progress.

Projects in flight

I am seeking representation for my memoir Hustling Vinyl, about growing up on the spinning edge of the vinyl record business during the golden age of rock music. Hustling Vinyl has been long-listed for the Bridport Memoir Prize and the project received the support of PEN America through a 2026 PEN/Jean Stein Grant for Literary Oral History.

It has been said that reading is inhaling and writing is exhaling. Here’s what I’m reading now or just put down.

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